Porter Robinson’s Secret Sky Music Festival is Now Live [Watch]

Porter Robinson‘s Secret Sky Music Festival is officially live! Today’s digital festival event begins with a special performance by DJ Potero, which is Porter Robinson’s original alias. Viewers are expected to to dance to some of the sweet sounds of 2010 electro house.

Today’s event will be giving fans some incredible performances from artists such as Jai Wolf, G Jones, Madeon, and Porter Robinson himself. In addition, there will also be performances from artists you may not have heard of before. Most likely, by the end of this digital event, you will have a new favorite DJ you’ll love to listen too. You can view the set times here.

Secret Sky exists because of circumstances nobody wanted. Porter had already built Second Sky, his real-world festival themed around anime, video games, and internet culture, into an annual tradition since it debuted in Oakland back in June 2019. With large gatherings off the table in the spring of 2020, Robinson and his team pivoted hard, turning what would have been the 2020 edition of Second Sky into a livestreamed, donation-driven event instead. Rather than just phoning it in with a single DJ set, the team built out a fully interactive digital festival grounds, complete with a virtual venue, merch booth, and main stage, so fans could get something closer to the real festival experience from their couch.

The cause behind it matters too. Secret Sky was run as a benefit livestream, with proceeds going toward the MusiCares COVID-19 Relief Fund to help support music industry workers who lost income when touring and live shows shut down almost overnight. It’s a good reminder that even in the middle of a scrapped festival season, artists were finding ways to give back to the crews, techs, and support staff who make festivals like Second Sky possible in the first place.

The lineup backs up the hype too. Jai Wolf and Madeon are both longtime Porter collaborators and friends within the scene, G Jones brings a completely different, bass-heavy flavor to the bill, and Porter closing out the day himself means fans get to see the guy behind the whole event perform on his own turf. Second Sky has always leaned into being more of a community celebration than a typical festival cash grab, and that spirit carried over into the livestream format surprisingly well.

Watch Secret Sky Music Festival here.

Second Sky would go on to return as a proper in-person event in the years that followed, but for one day in May 2020, Secret Sky gave fans stuck at home something to genuinely look forward to, and raised money for a good cause while doing it.